


Touches

by CrumblingAsh



Series: The Stupid Secrets We Keep [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Childhood Sexual Abuse, Everything Hurts, Graphic Depiction of Child Abuse, Hurt Peter, M/M, Molestation, Past Child Abuse, Peter Feels, Tony Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-04
Updated: 2014-09-04
Packaged: 2018-02-16 03:12:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2253684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrumblingAsh/pseuds/CrumblingAsh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes, it's just as hard to be the one standing, as it is to be the one broken.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Touches

* * *

* * *

 

 

_The summer sun shines through the windows, and the child is young, no older than four._

_Brown eyes wide and sparkling, beaming with the laughter that erupts from his mouth in giggles._

_The man hovering over him, older by decades, is laughing too._

_They seem happy, and everything’s okay._

_“It’s okay, Peter.”_

_The man’s hand, weathered and spotted, travels down the boy’s chest, up his shirt, gentle, petting._

_The child’s laughter is softer, curious, the same wide eyes following the motion._

_“This is okay.”_

_The shirt is gone, pants undone. The hand travels childish white apparel of dinosaurs and blue bands._

_The laughter has stopped, head tilted in fascinated consideration as strange fingers go where they haven’t before._

_“This is okay.”_

 

 

Tony Stark fixes things.

His hands move over broken things, and when they pull back, it’s either restored, or better.

He doesn’t dare touch Peter.

The nights he can’t sleep, when the little boy in his dreams stares out with vacant eyes, Tony stands on the other side of Peter’s door.

He doesn’t open it, doesn’t knock, doesn’t go in.

He just stands there.

 

 

 

_The lamps have been turned on to mimic the sun during the night, and the child is young, no older than thirteen._

_He’s dressed in black, lingering on the edge of teenage angst in apparent eagerness, sprawled across a couch, lips moving with inaudible words as his brown eyes narrow in confusion._

_A man, much older, sits in the middle of the couch, thigh brushing feet, hand on knee, nodding along in understanding._

_“I know, son. It’s all strange, but I promise it’s normal. You’re normal._

_“I can show how to make it feel better, if you want.”_

_The hand squeezes soothingly; the child looks hopeful. Trust._

_“You don’t mind? I don’t want to be a bother.”_

_“You’re not a bother, Peter. I want to help.”_

_The hand travels, slowly, carefully upward, brushes with purposefully in a way that makes the child’s breath catch._

_Brushes again more firmly for the same reaction, fingers skimming the zipper._

_“I want to help, Peter.”_

 

 

Tony doesn’t kiss Bruce, anymore.

It’s in consideration of Peter, Tony tells him, tells himself. Just in public.

Only it doesn’t stay confined to public places.

In their room, against their sheets, Bruce hovering above him, hungry and tempting, Tony closes his eyes to sensation-

Sees a child in the door way, large eyes haunted and full of tears, lips trembling in untold scares.

“I can’t!” He gasps out, pushes away. “I can’t!”

Bruce always stops.

Tony always leaves.

 

 

 

“This is why I didn’t tell you!”

“Peter, _please_.”

“It was nothing. It happened-“

“Stop-“

“It’s done! Alright? It’s fucking done! There’s nothing there to be taken care of, or bandaged, or fixed. _Because nothing happened._ ”

“Something _did happen,_ Peter.”

 _“ **Let it go, Cap**_ **.”**

A door slams. Steve sighs, defeated and anguished.

Tony flinches and walks away before he’s seen.

 

 

_“Is this okay?”_

_“Well, does it feel okay?”_

_“It feels … funny.”_

_“Good funny or bad funny?”_

_“…Weird funny?”_

_“But in a good way?”_

_“Yeah, I… I guess. It does. At the end, when you do that … that thing.”_

_“Want me to do that this time?”_

_“…”_

_“Peter? It’s okay if you do. If it makes you happy. I like making you happy.”_

_“…Please?”_

 

Some nights, when Tony stands outside the door, he hears the faintest sounds of crying.

Small whimpers, stuttered breaths escaping through cracks in a quickly-built wall.

It makes him gag, makes him sick.

He holds the toilet and throws up until his throat’s screaming, until it’s a whole new gagging.

Blares music until he can’t hear it anymore.

 

 

 

 

The kid. He’s a kid. Compared to all of them, he’s a kid.

Tony is an adult.

“Hey, Tony.”

“Hey, Peter. Can’t talk right now, Pepper needs these. Later?”

“…Okay.”

“Great!”

He can’t get away fast enough.

 

 

_“I need you to help me with something, Peter.”_

_“Okay.”_

_“You know how sometimes I use my mouth?”_

_“On my … down there?”_

_“Yep, down there. You remember how good it makes you feel? How happy?”_

_Blush. “Y-yeah. I mean, yes sir. I do.”_

_Chuckle. “I’ve forgotten what that feels like. A mouth on me.”_

_“Oh.”_

_“But maybe not. Your tongue is so small yet, Peter. And your mouth might not be big enough…”_

_“I have a big mouth!”_

_Another chuckle. “That you do. But I don’t know if you can fit me-.”_

_“I can! I put a whole apple in my mouth last Thursday after Flash said I couldn’t. I can do it! ”_

_The chuckling becomes full, soft laughter. Fond and indulging. “Can you?”_

_“I **can!** ”_

_“Can you ask for it? You told me yesterday you’re getting in trouble at home for forgetting your manners. We should probably practice.”_

_“Oh, yeah. Okay! May I please put my mouth on your … down there?”_

_“Good job, buddy. Sure you can. I’ll hold it for you, though. It’s a little bigger than yours.”_

_“Thank you, Tony!"_

 

 

“TONY!”

_“Peter!”_

It’s dark; he can’t see. The world feels like it’s shaking, every breath he takes is burning. Where’s Peter?

“Tony!”

“Don’t do it,” he pleads. Maybe the boy can hear him, even if he can’t see him. God, let Peter hear him, “Peter, God. Don’t. I’m sorry. You don’t have to do it _I’m sorry_!”

“ _Tony!_ Breathe. You have to breathe, Tony, please. It’s Bruce, Tony. It’s just me. Peter isn’t here. It’s just you and me. It’s just been you and me.”

Bruce?

The voice is hot breath against his ear, ragged and frantic– the firm chest against his back is practically punching breaths into him at a forcefully steady rhythm. It’s familiar; his brain registers the calming technique from multiples times before. There’s a hand splayed across his chest, an arm wrapped around his stomach.

“Open your eyes, Tony.”

He does, he does. Trips over the foggy image of the child that immediately fades as his eyes adjust instantly to the low glow of the moon through the bedroom window. The bedroom window. His bedroom.

He sucks in a breath. Two. Three. They’re just as hot as the ones before.

“Bruce?” Not Peter. The arm tightens fractionally.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were having nightmares about it?”

About _it._ About Peter. About Peter and his past. About the faceless, nameless man they’ll never find. About the shadows on Peter’s face and the child he once was.

 _Because it’s stupid,_ he wants to say, but it’s not. _Because they’re stupid, just nightmares_. But they’re not. They happened. In some way, they happened. Peter happened. It’s not nothing.

“They’re not mine to have,” he protests hoarsely instead in old denial. The heat flows out with the admission, and he shivers under the onslaught of cold, unconsciously pushing closer to the other man. “…because I can’t fix it.”

Bruce drags him closer still in answer, burrowing his face into Tony’s neck. He doesn’t press in a kiss, doesn’t even tease one, just holds on, body trembling with echoing shivers Tony doesn’t register as once again the child stands in the doorway, staring at him with sad, confused eyes.

 

 

 

 

_Morning light drifts the windows, and the child is young, no older than twenty-two._

_He’s strong, beautiful, dressed in heroic red and blue; his eyes are unrelentingly bright with intelligence he can’t mask even as he speaks._

_“He touched me._

_I touched him. When he asked me to._

_That was all._

_It was weird, yeah._

_But sometimes … fuck, sometimes I liked it, you know?_

_Sometimes it actually felt good._

**_Howsickisthat?_ **

_But that was all that happened._

_He didn’t rape me._

_There wasn’t any sex involved._

_It was just … touching._

_No big deal.”_

Some nights, Bruce doesn’t sleep.


End file.
